Itahari, Nov 17-Chief Minister of Province 1 Rajendra Rai has secured a vote of confidence on Wednesday afternoon. He obtained 50 votes which is three more votes than required 47 votes to obtain majority in the 92-member Provincial Assembly. A total of 79 Provincial Assembly members were present in the voting process.Rai secured all votes of all members of the five-party coalition of the Province which are Nepali Congress (21), CPN (Maoist Center) (15), CPN Unified Socialist (10), People’s Socialist Party (3) and Federal Democratic National Forum (1).

Main Opposition and the largest party in the Provincial Assembly of the Province 1, CPN (UML) voted against Rai. CPN (UML) had whipped its members to vote against Rai. Many Provincial Assembly members from CPN (UML) were absent the voting process. Only 29 members appeared to vote against Rai.

On 2 November, Rai was appointed third CM of Province 1 after the second CM Bhim Acharya resigned from his 68-day-long tenure as the CM.
Rai is the directly elected Provincial Assembly member from Bhojpur Constituency Number 1 (1). He had obtained 19,297 against his rival Ajambar Kangbang’s 11,551 votes.CM Rai has also an experience of working as the Public Relations Advisor to the former Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal from 2009 to 2011. (RSS)